Top facts about MSU head basketball coach Tom Izzo
Discover key facts about Tom Izzo, the legendary head basketball coach at Michigan State University, his contributions, achievements, and impact on the sport.
EAST LANSING — There comes a point when the combination of talent and potential morphs into something more definitive.
Michigan State basketball might have arrived at that crossroad.
With a blend of precision and tenacity, of play-making and toughness, of overwhelming offense and dominating defense, the 25th-ranked Spartans dispatched Nebraska on Saturday afternoon, 89-52, at Breslin Center. It was as methodical and overwhelming a display of basketball that Tom Izzo has seen in recent years — and perhaps one of the most balanced efforts of his 30 seasons in charge.
All 10 rotation players scored at least four points and grabbed at least two rebounds, led by 18 points from Jaden Akins and 16 from Jase Richardson. But the contributions went far deeper, with Jaxon Kohler grabbing 12 of MSU’s dominating 48 rebounds to Nebraska’s 19.
Xavier Booker had 11 points and six boards. Kohler, Tre Holloman and Coen Carr each scored eight. The Spartans went 22-for-23 at the free throw line and had a 17-3 edge in second-chance points and an 18-7 advantage on the break. And Jeremy Fears Jr. had eight assists as MSU had 20 helpers on 29 made baskets.
After starting with a pair of conference losses last season, the Spartans (8-2, 2-0 Big Ten) have opened this season with a pair of Big Ten victories for the first time since 2021-22. They are off until Dec. 17, when they travel to Little Caesars Arena in Detroit to face Oakland (7 p.m., ESPN2). They don’t resume Big Ten play until Jan. 3 at Ohio State, after two final nonconference home games against Florida Atlantic on Dec. 21 and Western Michigan on Dec. 30.
Andrew Morgan scored 14 points and Brice Williams 11 for Nebraska (6-2, 0-1), which shot just 33.3% overall and 28.6% in the second half as MSU pulled away.
No fear for Fears
The mojo MSU mounted in Minnesota on Wednesday to coast to an 18-point Big Ten-opening win carried over to the outset Saturday.
Fears continued the strong ball movement and court vision he and the Spartans showed in recent games, setting up Holloman for a 3-pointer to open things and hitting Szymon Zapala for a layup after the big man’s tap-out rebound kept possession alive. It was part of a 7-0 blitz in the first 2½ minutes.
The Huskers answered and tied it 11-all, but MSU marched off on a 24-11 burst over a nearly nine-minute span that included a pair of 9-0 runs. Akins bookended the first with a 3-pointer and two free throws, and the second sparked by a seated assist from Fears on an alley-oop to Carr that both stunned and got the Breslin crowd roaring when they realized what happened.
Richardson had seven of his nine first-half points in a minute-plus span, with a pair of free throws with 3:29 before half that built the Spartans’ lead to 15. But Nebraska again countered with a 9-0 run of its own. Williams’ second-chance 3-pointer after it appeared MSU had a stop forced Izzo to call timeout with 1:15 left in the opening period.
Out of it, Kohler got a tip-in bucket, then Fears found the junior center again for a layup just before the buzzer to send the Spartans into halftime ahead, 41-31.
Akins and Richardson each scored nine, while Kohler and Carr both had six points. MSU had a dominating 24-10 advantage on the boards and 20-10 scoring edge in the paint that included 10 second-chance points to just Williams’ 3 for Nebraska. The Spartans also went 12-for-12 at the free-throw line and had nine assists on their 13 baskets, six of them coming from Fears.
Second-half smothering
Izzo was frustrated after MSU’s win at Minesota that his team couldn’t put together a knockout punch once it went up double-figures.
Three days later, he got that and more.
The Spartans suplexed the Cornhuskers into submission with a smothering second-half defensive effort coupled with exceptional ball movement and pinpoint shooting, both from outside and down low. As cliché as it usually is when said, it was a total team effort.
Akins drained a 3-pointer to spark as dominating a run as MSU has seen in recent years, a 25-1 stretch that covered nearly eight minutes early in the second half. Akins would hit another triple in that stretch, but seven different players scored in that run.
Defensively, the Spartans held the Cornhuskers without a field goal for an 8:36 span 12 straight Nebraska misses — turning a 10-point cushion with 18:37 to play into a 68-34 blowout with back-to-back 3-pointers from Holloman and Booker at the midpoint of the final period.
Booker had all 11 of his points in the second half as the Spartans shot 61.5% and hit 6 of 11 from 3-point range after halftime.
Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.
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